I started a few hours after the [recent presidential] election. I went out and started doing [tags] and haven’t stopped since. I have been doing it out in public places usually at subway stations, but this time around, being that it’s 2017, I’ve been using social media to get them out there. They don’t usually last long much in these days on the subway, they buff them really quickly. You have about a day. But the social media is how really people are seeing it, Instagram, Facebook, etc.

Are you a fan of all these necessary social media methods you have to use today?

I am not a huge fan. I’m not an advocate. I’m not going to deny its existence or anything. I am going to utilize it because it's a whole new generation and audience. It’s very useful. You know, I never had a cell phone when I was a teenager or in my twenties or through my thirties. It was never part of our culture. But I’ll be 58 in June and I have had a cell phone since 2001, so to me it’s not completely shocking of a thing.

Do you think people miss the emotion trying to be expressed seeing it through a screen as opposed to on a subway?

Yes, it’s not the same experience. Certainly not. When you see something live, in person, it always has a much more effect. I mean how many times have you seen certain great art works, you know? Take something like Guernica or like the Mona Lisa. I never saw the Mona Lisa, but I bet when I saw it, the real one, I would be like, "Oh shit, I’m feeling being in the presence of this iconic and powerful object," or whatever. But it’s cool that you can see it at least in social media. It reaches an international audience. I get requests from people from Norway and Australia; by the standards of which myself and Basquiat were active that was totally inconceivable, the idea of people being that far away knowing what we were into.

How did this whole thing with the photographs start?

Through a friend who has a company called Street Art Direct; he came to a show of mine in 2015. He knew who I was and was asking me if I had any old photographs because he was interested in maybe making a few copies. I went through my old negatives but couldn’t find anything but. I did find prints and that’s when I found the portraits. It took us about a year and a half before we even did something. It was through Street Art Direct where I got together with the Gendron Brothers at House of Roulx and they were willing to work with the old black and white 4x4 snapshot prints and enhance them to 18x24 images. It took some time but now they are very handsome prints.

Basquiat 1976 by Al Diaz - House of Roulx

Why are these photos important?

They are important because there are not a lot of them, really and they are actually pretty decent portraits. Because there are a lot of images out there of later Basquiat, theses are the few of Basquiat before 'Basquiat' was 'Basquiat' in a sense. These are pictures of him, he is a more innocent human being, a less damaged soul.

Basquiat by Al Diaz - House of Roulx

Diaz also has a personal show coming up in New York in the Meatpacking district at a pop-up gallery called Red Bird with artist Ron English and possibly Shepard Fairey.